Fruit Salad

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This still life features pears, plums, bananas, and tangelos.  One of the most important features in this painting is the reflected light.  The banana has an orange reflection from the tangelo.  The bottom of the tangelo has a reflection from the plate.  Each fruit has a highlight  on it’s right side and the shadow side is on the left.  There are complementary colors (red and green)  and different shapes and sizes which add interest.

The owner of this painting hung this in her formal dining room, and the color of the paint in her room was chosen to fit this picture.

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Art School

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I was an art student at the university.  I was just weeks shy of graduating.  I was SICK, SICK, SICK of school.  I was tired of my professor.  He was a great man, but I was so ready to get out of there.  He always talked about how he despised clowns.  My last project in the class was supposed to be a self-portrait.  This is what I did.  The professor came over to help me–he saw the clown in the background and just walked away.  He never spoke to me again.

Yesterday was the anniversary of my graduation.  As I look back I am so grateful for the many hours of hard work and instruction that I endured.  I could never have become the artist I have become without it.  Anything worth having is worth sacrificing for . . .

I still think it’s funny though.

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Egg

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This is a piece I did in college.  We were learning about reflected light.  I had a box with a red and blue side and a yellow bottom.  Those are the primary colors.  I set an egg in there and immediately it picked up the colors that surrounded it.  I had a small paintbrush and put little dots of color as they appeared on the egg.  This is the best example of reflected light I know of.

If two people stand next to each other and one has a green shirt and the other one is white, the white one will pick up the green.  If the person in the white shirt stands outside on a sunny day, the part of his shirt in the shadow will pick up the color of the sky.

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Barricades on Market Street

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This is another Indianapolis cityscape.  It is from an icy winter day when west Market Street was under construction.  You can see the one-point linear perspective.  Everything flows to the front-center of the State Capitol building.  The road is wide towards the viewer, then narrows to the point.  The buildings on each side narrow down the closer they get to the same location.  Notice light and shadow on buildings and cars.  You can feel as though you are walking down the street.

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Pigs

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Although I live in the Indianapolis metro area, I am within five or ten minutes of farmland.  I can see many different types of farm animals, and a whole lot of corn.  This farm raises pigs.  If you look in the background you can see the pig shelters.  My wife thinks this painting should be called “HI” because the pig in the front seems like he  is saying that.

There are three sections in the painting:  the bottom one which has the animals, grass and weeds;  the middle has yellow grassland, trees and the shelters; the last one is the sky.   Being done that way presents atmospheric perspective  —  there is a feeling of depth.  Also it gives rythm to the picture and makes it more interesting.  OINK!

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Lily Pond

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This is a painting of Claude Monet’s lily pond in Giverny, France.  Claude Monet was the father of impressionism.  His story is unbelievable.  His influence on art has been amazing.  He is truly my hero.  I was so excited to go to France and stay in a hotel just a block or two down the little country road from his home.  It was almost a spiritual experience going to visit his gardens and this pond.  He created the pond himself and planted all of the water lilies and greenery around it.  He had spent so much time away from his family to paint, and now he could stay home and paint scenes from his own residence.

I have tried to portray the reflections in the water, the different values of green, and the lily-pads and flowers exactly as I saw them.  You would have to go there to understand the power of the place.

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Mike and Heidi

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This is a portrait of Mike and Heidi.  I wanted to paint them because in my mind, they were the perfect couple.  They love each other a lot and you can tell it whenever you’re around them.  They have a beautiful family of little girls.  Everyone they know feels so good to be around them because they treat others so nice.

I have positioned them so there is light and shadow on their faces.  You can see their facial structure,  There is volume.  Heidi is wearing a white shirt.  It is very simple in color, yet look at the different reflections it picks up  —  the red from his tie, the color of her skin.  Her light hair makes a beautiful contrast to the background behind her.  His dark suit and hair are another beautiful contrast.  I really love this painting.

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Illumination

9

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I’ve always been amazed by the glow of buildings lit up at night. I remember seeing the monuments in Washington, D.C. and wondering if they actually had light emanating from them. Since then I’ve been obsessed by nighttime colors and reflections. This is the Indiana State Capitol building. I wondered for a long time how I would portray it’s light. Then I finally used my old technique of finding shapes and values of color. I quit thinking about how the building seemed to glow by itself, and matched the actual colors I saw. As I did, the individual shapes and colors all fit together and the glow suddenly appeared.

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